For the first couple of months after his horrific neck injury, Zac Etheridge couldn’t look anywhere but straight ahead.His head stabilized by a bulky, two-piece neck brace, Etheridge needed to shift his entire body just to look left or right. To peer behind, he had to do a complete 180-degree turn — a surprisingly difficult maneuver for a player who, months earlier, was smashing into running backs who started a play on the opposite side of the field.So Etheridge stared forward, focused first on recovering all the strength he lost from months of inactivity and then on the improbable comeback to the football field he expects to make in the fall.“Once I got that off, I’ve been focused on moving forward and not having to look back,” Etheridge said. “The only reason I think about the neck is because everybody asks me about it.“My neck is fine, and I know it’s fine. Now it’s just building the strength and getting as strong as I can.”Every day since Oct. 31, 2009, when Etheridge tore numerous neck ligaments and cracked his C5 vertebrae after jarring his helmet into teammate Antonio Coleman’s shoulder pad, has been equally and vitally crucial toward getting Etheridge to this point. The next 30 or so, though, will probably feel like the longest for Etheridge, who will find out July 20 if he is clear to play his senior season.His mother, Cassandra Kelly, said Etheridge’s path back to the field is “in God’s hands now.”Etheridge has done everything he can to make sure there’s “no gray area” when he goes through that thorough examination, which will include a number of range-of-motion tests. Etheridge will also don a helmet and shoulder pads for the first time since they were carved off him after the scary collision.“No one has said ‘no’ yet,” Etheridge said. “It healed so fast and so perfect, so it’s like unbelievable. It’s so healed.”Once he was cleared to resume his normal, everyday activities, Etheridge devoted all his focus to his lower body, which understandably lost strength after an elongated amount of inactivity. The strength there isn’t where he wants it to be, but that’s not at all an indictment thatEtheridge is weaker than he was before that fateful hit.Ever since he was a high-schooler, whom his mother originally considered too scrawny for football, Etheridge has strived to gain strength on a yearly basis.Potential career-threatening injury notwithstanding, this year is no different.“It’s not where I want it to be because I’ve been out a long time, but, shoot, I’m lifting just as much as guys that have been working out through the season without injuries,” Etheridge said. “I’m satisfied with my strength and everything, but I want to get a lot more stronger.”The work on his neck, of course, has been an entirely different ordeal.When safeties coach Tommy Thigpen arrives at the Auburn Athletic Complex, he sees Etheridge in the weight room, working out his neck on a special machine that focuses specifically on that area of the body. When janitors come in for their shift, Etheridge is typically wrapping up the second half of his workout or breaking down film for the ump-teenth time.When he goes home to relax and watch TV, Etheridge straps weights onto his neck and swivels it from side to side. He’s currently holding 25-30 pounds, a total that increases with every week.“That right there, I do on my own,” Etheridge said. “I do that so when I go back to the doctor, there is no question about my strength or anything.”Thigpen doesn’t have a special connection to Etheridge’s injury just because he’s his position coach.When Thigpen was a sophomore in high school, he suffered a similar injury, cracking one of his vertebrae just like Etheridge did. Doctors and coaches told him his football career was over.As history stands, Thigpen went on to play four years at North Carolina and dabbled in the NFL before embarking on a coaching career. He came back to the field without going through the extensive rehabilitation procedures Etheridge is currently undergoing.“It was either play college football or go to the army,” Thigpen said. “And I was not going to the army.”Etheridge’s options aren’t that black and white.Before the injury, Etheridge knew he wanted to start a career in coaching the day his playing career ended. While many football players dread required trips to the film room, Etheridge relishes it. So much so that he can barely explain it, aside from mentioning that he’d be headed to the film room after this interview.“Our players really appreciate it that he can talk ball to the coaches,” Thigpen said. “I think he’s an inspiration, especially to our younger guys and those guys that don’t actually know run-fits and playing adjustments. Guys appreciate his mindset and they kind of want to get to where he’s at with learning the game.”Etheridge and his mother are both realistic about a potentially disappointing diagnosis.That Etheridge has felt zero pain since the initial injury, though, makes the optimism seemingly all the more realistic by the day.“I haven’t had anything,” Etheridge said. “The only thing it is has been is a slow process, but also a great humbling process, too.”Thigpen said Etheridge, coming off a season in which he led Auburn in tackles and was closing in on another title in that department, was playing his best football before the injury. He doesn’t expect that to change when — not if — Etheridge returns to the field. He won’t show any hesitancy throwing him right back into the fray, either.“It’s just going to become second nature,” Thigpen said. “He’s got the right mentality. In his mind, I think he thinks he’s coming back, so I don’t know why he’d keep coming back and watching film if he wasn’t going to play.”agribble@oanow.com | 737-2561
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